Description

From the author of I Believe in a Thing Called Love, a laugh-out-loud story of love, new friendships, and one unique food truck.

Clara Shin lives for pranks and disruption. When she takes one joke too far, her dad sentences her to a summer working on his food truck, the KoBra, alongside her uptight classmate Rose Carver. Not the carefree summer Clara had imagined. But maybe Rose isn't so bad. Maybe the boy named Hamlet (yes, Hamlet) crushing on her is pretty cute. Maybe Clara actually feels invested in her dad's business. What if taking this summer seriously means that Clara has to leave her old self behind? With Maurene Goo's signature warmth and humor, The Way You Make Me Feel is a relatable story of falling in love and finding yourself in the places you'd never thought to look.

About the Author

Maurene Goo grew up in a Los Angeles suburb surrounded by floral wallpaper, one thousand cousins, and piles of books. She studied communication at UC San Diego and then later received a Masters in publishing, writing, and literature at Emerson College. Before publishing her first book, Since You Asked, she worked in both textbook and art book publishing. She has very strong feelings about tacos and houseplants. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two cats.

Contents

Contents:

March 1, 2018
A spirited teenager learns about the meaning of love, friendship, and family.When spunky Clara Shin, the daughter of two Brazilian immigrants of Korean descent, is forced to make up for a school prank by taking a summer job working in her father's food truck alongside her nemesis, Rose Carver, a perfectionistic, overachieving classmate who looks like a "long-lost Obama daughter," she thinks it's the end of her summer. Clara's insouciant and rebellious demeanor hides profound feelings of rejection over her glamorous mother's decision to leave the family when Clara was 4 to jaunt around the world as a social media influencer. Clara is most comfortable hanging out with a crowd of kids who are similarly rebellious and disengaged, but a budding romance with earnest Chinese heartthrob Hamlet Wong, who works in a neighboring food truck, and a developing friendship with Rose, who has never had a BFF, teach Clara that there's an upside to taking risks and letting people get close. When Clara feels hurt by her father's negative reaction to a well-intentioned surprise, she takes off on an adventure that ultimately opens her eyes to all the good things that await her back home. Clara's personal growth during this summer of change is realistic and convincing.Snappy dialogue and an endearing cast of characters bring to life this richly-drawn portrait of multicultural LA. (Fiction. 12-18)

COPYRIGHT(2018) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 1, 2018

Gr 9 Up-"You simply couldn't out-jerk a jerk like me." Clara Shin, the protagonist in Goo's latest, delivers this line with pride. Life is a joke for prank-loving, prickly Clara, who is Korean Brazilian American. She has a blast with her friends, wistfully follows her social media influencer mother's exploits on Instagram, and keeps "realness" at arms' length. When one of her pranks lands her in real trouble, her hip dad tightens the reins, assigning her to a summer working in his sweltering food truck alongside her overachiever archenemy, Rose Carver. As the girls find a way to work together and eventually form a friendship, and Clara meets Hamlet, a cute boy whose earnestness pains her and makes her heart flutter, she warms up to the idea of actually caring about things. Clara's struggle with what her shift in attitude means for the identity, defenses, and friendships she has constructed for herself is sensitively drawn; even as readers cringe at some of her behavior, they'll be rooting for her. Hamlet's sweet inexperience veers into unintentional controlling behavior from time to time, but his openness gives Clara plenty of space to figure out what she wants. VERDICT Sweet, sexy, hilarious, and featuring a spectacular father-daughter relationship, this book will fly off the shelves.-Beth McIntyre, Madison Public Library, WI

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Kirkus Reviews "A spirited teenager learns about the meaning of love, friendship, and family. . .Snappy dialogue and an endearing cast of characters bring to life this richly-drawn portrait of multicultural LA."